


Hook

by JusticeBanana



Series: Devils Advocate [1]
Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Fusion, Angst, Art, Blind Character, Blind Derek Hale, Blood and Violence, Canon-Typical Violence, College Student Stiles, Daredevil AU, Dead Sheriff Stilinski, Deucalion Is Not Blind, Emotional Baggage, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Framed for murder, Hurt Stiles, Hurt/Comfort, Lawyer Derek, Lawyer Peter Hale, M/M, Murder, Mystery, Prompt Art, Reverse Big Bang Challenge, Scott is a Bad Friend, Sterek Reverse Bang, The Alpha Pack, The Defenders AU, city fic, gangwars, marvel AU
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-07-03
Updated: 2018-07-03
Packaged: 2019-06-04 20:47:26
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 16,848
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15155303
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/JusticeBanana/pseuds/JusticeBanana
Summary: “So now that we are gonna be in this car for a while, mind telling me a little about yourselves?“ Stiles asked as a truck stepped on the break’s in front of them, slamming the horn. Traffic was chaos and the bridge apparently only had one working lane in each direction.“What is there to know?” Peter asked like he had already told Stiles their life stories.“You guys have personalities right?”“Debatable.” Derek grunted.Where in Derek is a blind workaholic lawyer and Stiles get framed for a crime he didn't commit.





	Hook

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Anneofnyc](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Anneofnyc/gifts).



> So, first: this had been a wild, wild ride and what an amazing time it's been!  
> I had the amazing privilege to work with the most amazing Artonix and their art, man was I excited and now this fic exists!  
> This absolutely amazing artist and I got to write for it! I really hope I did the art justice and that you all like both Artonix art and my fic!  
> I also had the lovely Glorious-spoon beta my text and I'm amazed they didn't yell at me more at my super bad punctuation.  
> This fic has been a great help to get out of the slump I was in and I am so grateful to have had these people help me, and so many many more in the fandom to help! Blessed be all of you!  
> Extra shout out to Becka who let me whine and whine on about various things!  
> I've had so much fun, and extra points to whomever figures out the name of part two and three!  
> Xoxo  
> JB

Patricide is a funny word: he thinks it sounds like some fancy microbrewery in downtown Hollywood that makes organic beer, no, ale! All the same it makes for a funny word. Killing one’s father, one’s own flesh and blood. Family. It was laughable, he almost laughed as faces he’d seen his entire life looked at him with disgust and pulled him out of his childhood home in literal chains.  
  
  
Stiles looked down at his hands. There was blood on them, just a tiny smear, but blood nonetheless. The cuffs were chafing his skin and he could barely hold it together.   
He didn’t. He didn’t do this! Why would he?   
  


No one listened. 

 

♠ ♣ ♥ ♦

  
It was fucking cold down in the holding cells and Stiles had absolutely nothing to do but to replay the night’s event in his head fifteen times over an hour. He had screamed himself hoarse and in the end Officer Brunski’s patience had run out. He’d smacked Stiles’ head into the wall.  At least he got to sleep some. 

  
He woke up in a frankly medieval cell. It was full of convenient metal furniture and a toilet that was colder than the abominable snowman’s asshole. The whole cell was cold, not just the toilet. He had a blanket he wrapped himself in as he stared out into absolutely nothing, except from the bars that separated him from freedom and justice for whoever the fuck killed his father and left him to take the blame. It had been a few days but since they actually had enough to arrest him they had and could keep him here however long they needed to. They had barged in the middle of the night, claimed to know he’d done it. He’d been so confused as to why, why would he have? He was 23 years old and was going to go away for a murder he didn’t commit. Double Jeopardy style.

  
Stiles had woken up with a headache and dry throat and they manhandled him into the cruiser after a blur of questions and suspicion. At first, they held him to give a statement. The department had worked quicker than ever before because the following morning they read him his rights officially as the blood on the scene matched his father’s. He never got to leave the station and the headache was never leaving him the fuck alone.

  
They had been called about a disturbance by an anonymous caller who claimed to hear raised voices and breaking glass. Deputy Parrish had apparently let himself in, fearing the worst. The kitchen was nothing short of a bloodbath, curtains and refrigerator covered in splatter, no Stilinski to be seen on the bottom floor. Stiles figured he’d had done the same if he found a bloody kitchen, with no sign of the father but the son asleep in his bed, wearing blood stained jeans and with no recollections of the night beyond going to bed.    
  


But: It. Was. Not. Him.    
  
He was still staring out through the bars as he heard someone approaching. He was brought back to reality and the craving to just hurl his gut out almost took over.  Scott appeared in front of him, looking as if it was his puppy that Stiles had allegedly killed. It made Stiles heart plummet as he took in Scotts angry demeanour and his clenched jaw.

  
“S-Scott.” He sobbed as the tears once again started rolling. His friend was there, he’d know, he’d make sure that there was a real investigation. He’d make his father help him. 

 

Brunski came half a step after Scott along with Vice Sheriff Rafael McCall in tow. What Stiles expected were comfort and at least some form of “I’ll find out what happened for real.” But Scott looked like he’d swallowed a chair and it had stuck halfway down his throat. He didn’t speak, instead Vice Sheriff McCall stepped forward. He was wearing a suit rather than uniform and his eyes were speaking volumes. Stiles had never before seen Scott portray such disgust and the older McCall was looking at him in the same way. 

  
“Rest assured, we’ll set you up for life, what you did is despicable, and I personally wish the death penalty were still in action,” he said and Stiles visibly flinched. 

  
“You must know I didn’t do this!” he said, his voice still rough and filled with grief. 

  
“There is an avalanche of evidence against you, you were wearing clothes drenched in his blood!” Rafael continued, sparing no ammunition as he shot Stiles down with cruel but truthful words.

  
“What if he’s still alive and you won’t look because you can’t see past the fact that I am an easy target!” Stiles shouted and the both McCalls looked like he’d told them he’d fucked an entire football team. 

  
“You sliced him open good enough to almost drain him on blood, there were too much blood at the scene for your father to be alive,” he sneered and made ready to leave. Scott still hadn’t said anything, just stared at him with heavy eyes and twitching lips. “We will find where you left the body, and I will make sure you never see the light of day again.” 

  
“I DIDN’T DO THIS!” He felt the anger of the situation creep up his insides and he punched the wall as he yelled in outrage. He looked at Scott again and there was no softness now. “Scott, you gotta believe me buddy.” 

  
Scott spoke for the first time and Stiles wished he hadn’t as he looked him dead in the eye and said: 

 

“You need help, I should have seen this coming.” He turned around and left and Brunski grinned at Stiles completely defeated look.  _ “I should have seen this coming “ _ ringing in his ears on repeat like a shrill schoolbell.

  
“Come on Sheriff, you have an oath to take.” Brunski leered as he placed a hand on the other man’s shoulder and led him out of the holdings. 

 

Stiles didn’t do this. But someone did. And before he figured out why he needed to know who. But how the fuck would he do that from a cell? Scott had just dropped him like a hot potato and ran off to daddy and he had no help from the outside.

  
♠ ♣ ♥ ♦  
  
Derek was collecting the last of his papers and files as Peter walked away and did whatever he was doing when he left Derek to clean up their papers. Or rather Peter’s papers, Derek couldn’t read them. Peter had a tendency to not tell him what he went and did and he was grateful as well as annoyed, better to not know what illegal things he had his nose in but he worried for his uncle. He was just sliding the folder into his briefcase when he heard the shout. It vibrated through the building and Derek knew the person behind it to be true.   
  


He walked through the building and made his way towards the holding cells. He stopped when he heard the sniffling directly in front of him.    
  


“Do you have a lawyer?” he asked and waited for the answer. 

  
  
♠ ♣ ♥ ♦

  
Stiles halted to a stop as a gruff looking and equally gruff sounding man stood before the bars. 

  
“Do you have a lawyer?” he asked again and Stiles knew that whatever ass they would send him would be bullshit considering he had no money.

  
“I don’t have any money for one so I guess one was appointed to my case,” Stiles looked the man over as he answered. He was undoubtedly handsome. Black fixed hair, a suit that looked like several thousand bucks and a body looking like it was delivered from ancient greece on a silver platter. 

  
“I’ll take you pro bono.” He didn’t have time to finish as another, equally handsome man appeared next to the other. 

  
“ Count on you to find the handsome young damsel in distress despite being blind, nephew .” 

 

The other man was about an inch shorter but had an intimidatingly broad and dangerous body. Stiles looked over at the first man and realized his sunglasses were for other purposes considering the man had a foldable cane in his belt. 

  
“Who are you?” Stiles asked sceptically. 

  
The older of the two tutted and gave a creepy smile as he looked first at his nephew and then at Stiles. 

 

“Hale & Hale, defence attorneys. Apparently taking you on pro bono. Name’s Peter and this is my nephew Derek. Pleasure.”    
  


Somehow Stiles doubted it was a pleasure, but he’d take it. Everyone knew that if the Hales choose to represent you, you got free.   
  


“Alright. Name’s Stiles Stilinski. Please get me out of here!” he said and the older man snorted and gave him the of course talk. He told then what the officers had told him and they would get his file before they left and be back tomorrow. Derek had been quiet the entire time but looked like he absorbed the information like a sponge.    
  


“One more thing before we go.” Peter said and turned to Brunski who had stood and looked like someone spit in his cereal while they listened to Stiles. “How did he get those bruises?” Peter nodded over to Stiles and Brunski flinched. 

  
“Thrashing around in the cell like a maniac is one of the few things he seems to enjoy. Must have smacked his head into the wall somehow.”

  
“Care to answer again?” Peter goaded.

  
“Absolutely not, I am telling you all I know.” Brunski said and Derek shook his head at Peter who now looked vivid. 

  
“Alright, then I need those security tapes right now so that we can determine what happened to our client and his safety in here,” Peter sneered and Brunski turned pale.    
  


“Very well, let me go get them,” he spat and turned, but before he could walk off Peter was there with a hand on his shoulder.    
  


“I think I will come with you and we’ll get an officer to sign them out, I need them to be legal in case I don’t like what I see.” He smiled predatorily and followed Brunski up the stairs.

 

Derek was still there, turned towards Stiles. He took out his cane and looked unsure. 

  
“I know you didn’t do this, we’ll help you out. Did that officer do that to you?” he said and motioned at Stiles. How he knew Stiles was where he was Stiles couldn’t say, but he was spot on as he turned his eyes towards him, glasses on the top of his head now. 

  
“Well, yeah, unsure if that matters though. I’m pretty sure it’ll be looked upon as necessary force.” 

  
“We’ll see about that. We will be back tomorrow. Hang on, Stiles.”

  
“How do you know I’m innocent? I mean, I am, but how do you believe me when not even my best friend does?” he asked, and Derek looked like he pitied him. Stiles hated that look.

  
“I know you aren’t lying, Stiles.” he doesn’t say how but Stiles is grateful either way. “Make sure someone looks over your injuries!” he continued before he disappeared out of sight and all Stiles could hear was the click of the cane against the floor as the man made his way out after his uncle and Officer Brunski. 

  
  
♠ ♣ ♥ ♦

  
Stiles woke up a few days later from Brunski’s horrid voice carrying over to him from outside his cell.    
  


“You can’t just barge in here and make me release prisoners!” he yelled, and Stiles was wide awake all of a sudden. Had they done it? Would his bail hearing be moved forward?    
  


“You won’t  _ just _ release him, we have a hearing to get too, the ADA informed us. Considering the video that was released to us I’d like to be able to report that you complied with our wishes, which we are fully at our right to actually pursue. Let. Him. Out.” Derek’s voice rang through Stiles body and he had never been happier to hear a man’s voice.    
  


“Stiles, come on. We got your bail-hearing moved forward. We need to go immediately. Don’t worry about attire, Peter brought a suit.” 

  
Stiles hoped they granted him bail. He knew the odds were slim, but the case was all but normal.    
  
“All rise!” he heard as the judge walked in. She wasn’t big, wasn’t mean looking and Stiles was pretty sure Scott snuck around with her daughter in high school for like a week. Judge Yukimura smiled to the courtroom before she sat down.

  
“Please be seated. We’re here to set a bail for Mr. Stilinski regarding the murder of his father. Normally I would say that such a crime and against such a well-regarded person would result in you staying in jail until your hearings and sentencing. But considering the circumstances of Officer Brunski’s forceful nature, your attorneys has claimed it a nonviable option to be in police custody and that you are in danger if you stay. Which I frankly wholeheartedly agree with. Since there is no body and until proven otherwise you are innocent and innocent men don’t run I will release you on bail considering the evidence provided to me are a mess.” She was calm and collected and Stiles tried to mimic her easy rhythmic breaths. 

  
“The bail however will be set high, not only because you are arrested for the murder of an Officer and our Sheriff at that but because of the fact that you are considered a flight risk. This paired with the dangers claimed to be to your person if you stay in police custody the bail will be set to 740 000 dollars, a bit lower than I would normally go for such a case. You and your attorney will have to report to me two times a week and I need to know where you will be staying and you will need to stay within Beacon Hills and in your attorneys care, which means Beacon Valley, campus and downtown Beacon City is off limits. If these terms are violated in any way you will be taken into custody once more and stay there until the sentencing is done. Now, Mr. Stilinski this is all but regular occurrence and you need to understand the chance you have been given and the favor I am doing you. Use your time well.” 

 

After that she banged her gavel, rose and walked away. Stiles was in a haze of emotions and couldn’t think straight as the Hales guided him out of the courtroom.   
“Judge Yukimura has a knack for knowing things, being in tune with her gut feeling so to say. Having her believing you are no threat is a good thing, and we can help you get out of the charges.” Derek said as they walked out the room. All Stiles could think about though was the fact that he had no idea if he’d come across 740 thousand fucking dollars even if he mortgaged the house five times over and also sold everything he owned.

  
“I can’t afford the bail though, how would I get that amount of money,” he stated more than asked. 

 

Peter snorted and Derek stopped in his tracks. 

  
“That’s why the officers in there looked so smug, thought they have you back at the end of the day.” Peter said and clapped Stiles on the back. No bail bondsman would deal with the son and alleged murderer of the sheriff, Stiles knew that, which meant Brunski would be using him as his own personal punching bag for at least months more. 

  
“Don’t listen to Peter, we have the money. It’s bail, not a purchase, we’ll get it back because you won’t run and you’ll be attending every court meeting you’re supposed to go too and at the end of all this we get our money back and you will not be charged with murder. Now let’s get down to the registry.”

 

Stiles did nothing but nod and squeeze out a tiny yes.

  
“Address here,” the older man said, looking bored, and Stile stared at it for minutes. He was worried about not having money to get out, but he should have worried about where he’d stay if he actually did. The house was a crime scene and his dorm room was out of his reach. Derek nudged at Peter who sighed but snatched the pen out of Stiles’ hand and scribbled down an address at the paper at which the man behind the desk took it back, signed it and slid an ankle-monitor over the table to the even more bored looking police officer who clipped it around Stiles leg. 

  
“You can’t leave the area described to you which in this case is Beacon Hills but there are no other restrictions. God knows why they are so lenient. Enjoy it kid, won’t be long until you are back,” he said. 

 

Stiles gaped at him as he motioned to the door. Derek just grabbed his arm and let Stiles guide them out. Peter looked more smug than ever when they passed the officers who’d been in the courtroom. If Stiles turned around and stuck his tongue out no one could blame him. Tara laughed but he figured she’d soon be back to hating him.    
  
“Why didn’t you just fend Brunski off when he came at you?”

  
“What, you saw the video right?” Stiles said and Peter just raised his eyebrow.

  
“Look, I’m 147 pounds, sarcasm is my only defence!” 

  
“Maybe years ago, you are not a tiny guy Stiles, and if you don’t know how to defend yourself I’ll teach you.”

  
“My dad taught me alright, I just didn’t see the point in smacking him on the floor, what good would it have done?” 

  
“You’d be whole and unhurt,” Derek said and Stiles had almost forgotten that he was there.

  
“Yeah but I’d most likely be charged with force against an officer. I don’t want to have battery added to my charges too, might as well just let him. Brunski would make sure it stuck too if he pressed any charges. Sadistic son of a bitch, my father’s looking for a way to get rid of him. Oh, or was, I guess,” he said and once more his world felt like it literally tilted and he tried to catch a breath of air. Somehow he couldn’t. He tried to get air into his lungs but it was seemingly impossible and he could feel himself falling into panic in the Hales’ car. Derek was next to him and Stiles could hear him saying something but he couldn’t hear what, the roaring in his ears was too loud. Then there was a smack on his cheek and he gulped in a large breath of air. 

  
Derek was talking to him and running his hand up and down his back. “Good, now another breath, Stiles, easy, breath in for three let out for four. There you go.” 

  
“Told you it would work on him too.” Peter said and started the car.    
  


“Me too?” Stiles asked confused. 

  
“Worked like a charm on Derek, and me too for that matter. The shock of the hit pulls you straight out of the panic, thought it would on you too. I was right,” he smiled and turned towards the bridge to the neighborhoods of Beacon Hills. Disaster paradise as Stiles had named it as a child. Breathing coming easier and easier and Derek still rubbing soothing circles on his back.

  
“Oh,” he said and looked out the window. “Where are we going, where am I staying. What are we gonna-”

  
“Stiles, shut up. We are going to our firm, we are staying there and so are you,” Derek said and Stiles sulked a little. 

  
“As to what we are going to do, we are going to lurk around a little and try to find stuff out,” Peter said. “Derek, you should go find Erica, she could probably help.” 

 

Derek just grunted an affirmative. Stiles thought he was awfully grumpy for a lawyer who just went around and made sacrifices for strangers. But as anyone else who ended up in the Hills, it was probably trauma who got him there. The place was built on deceit and drama, the Beacon City equivalent of a catastrophe. 

  
Stiles had grown up in the suburban area of Beacon City; Beacon Valley with a white picket fence and all, and Scott too, they went to North Valley high school and that was fun and preppy. Normal middle class or working class children everywhere and jackasses and rich people were elsewhere, which had suited Stiles who was fed up of all spoiled brats he’d met and went to school with in junior high, because for some reason there wasn’t a private school for all the angry rich kids so they had to work and study with the plebs.

  
“Who’s Erica?” he asked after a while and Peter just grinned and Derek looked bored. Derek with his stupid beautiful blind face, and his stupid good samaritan act, saving him from jail. He wanted to punch him and kiss him at the same time. 

  
“Erica is our bounty hunter friend. Isn’t she, Derek?” Peter positively grinned and Derek just sighed and hummed an answer.    
  
“So now that we are gonna be in this car for a while, mind telling me a little about yourselves?“ Stiles asked as a truck stepped on the break’s in front of them, slamming the horn. Traffic was chaos and the bridge apparently only had one working lane in each direction. 

  
“What is there to know?” Peter asked like he had already told Stiles their life stories. 

  
“You guys have personalities right?”

  
“Debatable.” Derek grunted. 

 

It was the first time during the ride Derek gave a direct answer and it made Stiles laugh out loud. It was a bit unclear whether or not it actually was a joke but it was an answer at least. Then Derek shocked him even more by continuing talking. “My father and Peter used to own a firm together. My father had it first then when Peter graduated they ran it together. There were a few incidents so to say and the firm shut down. I graduated a bit late but once I finished, Peter and I started it back up again.”

  
“I have worked with this for thirteen years now and Mr. Talkative over here has been joining me for about a year,” Peter added.

  
“How old are you guys? I thought you were like approximately the same age?“ Stiles asked and Peter laughed.

  
“I’m 42. There’s almost a decade between us. My brother was already in law school when I started walking. Had his first kid when I won my first spelling bee and Derek came along when I was ten,” Peter talked on and Stiles just nodded and asked a few tiny leading questions from time to time but in the end he figured out that there had been a huge family of Hales and now there were three apparently. He knew he had some memory of a family tragedy from when his dad just started his position as the sheriff. 

  
Was it the fire? Or the murder house? Maybe the bus crash? He’d have to Google it, or even just wait, maybe not ruin everything before he was actually free from charges. 

  
“So Derek, you are 33, 34?”

  
“34, yes.”

  
“Cool, cool. It’s so good for me that you are a big shot lawyer already!“

  
“I just wanted to get done, being blind has its drawbacks, but going blind only made it more important for me,” Stiles were pretty sure it was rare for Derek to talk so much considering how shellshocked Peter looked as he stopped the car in the garage and Derek talked about his career path. “And don’t call me dude,” Derek added before he stepped out of the car.    
  


“I have a few things to do,” Peter said through the rolled down car window.  “Go with Derek and find Erica, maybe she has some information about what is happening in town. If something is going down that’s big enough to get the sheriff out of the way, it’s operated from here. And Stiles, my nephew knows that you aren’t lying. He will also know if you start lying. That’s something to remember.“ 

 

Stiles nodded and Peter simply drove off. Had his eyes changed color there? Briefly? Or were Stiles going crazy? 

  
“Hey, Derek wait!“ Stiles wheezed as he ran to catch up to the older man who had started to walk off towards the exit to the street, his cane clicking against the concrete flooring. A light bulb flickered as Stiles stopped by Derek “Where are we going?” at that Derek stopped too and sighed. He stood as if listening for something before he turned and pointedly told Stiles to follow.

  
“So like, please stop me before I ruin everything but, how did you learn to be this elegant and good at knowing the way and stuff while being blind?” 

  
“I have really good hearing,” he said matter of factly and Stiles shrugged.    
  


“Okay. Fair.”   
  


“Is there a blond woman about a block away?” Derek asked and Stiles nodded before he caught himself. “Ugh, yes! “

  
“You just nodded, didn’t you?” Derek asked and honest to god smirked and Stiles was about to deny it as he heard a roar that made him stop midstep.

  
He watched as the girl, woman, lifted a fucking car, laughing as the poor driver crawled out in the air and fell to the ground. 

  
“Where is Jackey, Michael? Where is your piece of shit brother?” 

  
“I… I d-don’t k-know!” he screamed as she lifted him up. 

  
“Try again muchacho!” she leered, and Stiles was pretty sure the guy wet himself. 

  
“He’s at Tony’s, at the i-inters-section of-” 

  
“I know where Tony’s is. Thanks. Stay safe, there is a lot of crazy people out here!” and she just sashayed away. If Stiles weren’t so unbelievably drawn to men, he’d be at her feet by then. Her heels clicked into the distance and Derek just kept leading Stiles in her direction. Were they looking for her?! Fuck no, he’d be skewered. 

  
“Erica, slow down, I know you’ve seen us.” 

 

“Did she just lift a fucking car!?” Stiles half shouted and half wheezed. He stared at the woman in shock as she made her way towards what Stiles assumed was Tony’s.

  
The woman stopped, turned around and leered as she waited for Derek and Stiles to catch up. Derek just turned towards Stiles and shrugged before making his way over.

  
“Who’s this little good looking piece of ass?” she asked and Stiles felt the need to hide.    
  


“My client. I need to know what’s happening in town.”

  
“So a long version. Let’s get to Tony’s, help me get the idiot to his father and then we can talk all night. Maybe more. Also what the hell is a Stiles?” she said and winked at Stiles.

  
“I’m Stiles.” He said and did a little wave. Like he always did when he felt intimidated. Stupid habits die hard. He would hide if he could. She leered like a cat. Derek grunted and kept walking, Erica winked at him as they followed the older grumpier man. 

  
“Is he really blind man, I mean he bumps into things less than I do,” he said out of honest envy. “Also you just lifted a car.”

  
“He’s supernatural Stiles, and I did. It comes in handy,” she said and Stiles could get it. Like Derek wasn’t actually supernatural because that didn’t exist but he surely was something, as well as Erica. But he also knew that supernatural wasn’t an option but boy it sure seemed like he was blessed with some superhuman hearing as he turned around and grunted at Stiles that he sure was blind. Erica just grinned.   
  


They arrived at Tony’s and it seemed like any other bar in Beacon Hills. It was sleazy, packed with drunks and criminals and lo and behold: Jackson Whittemore.  He was slobbering around, literally falling of his chair as he tried to get away from Erica. 

  
“Stop following me you slut,” he hissed as he threw a glass towards Erica.

  
“Eloquent as ever, Jacks!” Stiles shouted and Jackson stopped moving all together. The flabbergasted look told Stiles all he needed to know about how his old junior high classmate was doing. Answer: not good, not good at all. 

  
“Please just get away from me! He’ll get his goddamn money I just need to get back on my feet!” he slurred and slumped together and Stiles had to pick his jaw from the floor. Jackson was beyond hammered. He’d never been his friend, quite the opposite, but they had once upon a time shared an ice pack at the nurse’s office when they got in one of their fights. One thing Jackson never were was defeated but he looked like he’d been dragged through hell. Literally. 

  
“Yeah, no can do Jackey, daddy dearest want you home,” Erica sighed and leaned against the bar.

  
“He’s not my father!” Jackson sneered.

  
“He’s still paying me to take you to him.” Erica was getting impatient and Jackson seemed to notice.

  
“Fine, fine. Not like I can pay you more than him. He’s like a goddamned mafia boss.” He said and walked towards Erica.

  
“Hey, Catwoman, can we have a few minutes first? I haven’t seen him since what, that one weekend in high school?” he asked and Jackson shrugged.

  
“Go ahead, I’m in no hurry, I get paid the same no matter the time it takes.” she shrugged and called for the barkeep.

 

“Well you are better company anyway,” Jackson shrugged.

  
“Me over your dad, the Mayor?” Stiles snorted as he sat down next to Jackson. His life seriously threw some punches. Jackson was doing nothing but drinking his beer and staring at his hands.  

  
“He threw me out and disowned me for dropping out of the university he blackmailed people to get me into and now. Now he wants his college fund back because I couldn’t actually go to Harvard because I would never have made the cut if he hadn’t payed of the entire board. Said having good merits from a good school was my last chance to make it up to him.” His adam’s apple bobbing as he spoke, his voice cracking at places and Stiles didn’t pity Jackson, he probably never would but he did feel a strange form of compassion towards the man. 

  
“Make what up to him?” Stiles knew he shouldn’t have asked, the man had been touchy about his family as a child too. 

  
“Adopting me. Look, Stilinski,” he said and slid of the chair, almost braining himself on the bar on the way over. “Not everyone has father like, like yours. Mine is an abusive ass who now is making sure I never have a dime or a life again because I couldn’t be the son he bought. Now either let me pass out on the toilet or let’s go get me robbed,” he said as he turned to Erica who sighed and patted him on the back. Jackson had started acting out before he started being an ass to Stiles so he’d never taken it as hard as he could have. He’d started to think his worth was linked to being adopted, which meant he was always trying to be the best at everything and hindsight is 20/20, Stiles got it now. 

  
“Well make sure you’re not framed for his murder if that ever happens,” he said sarcastically. 

  
“Oh right. Well rest assured if anyone ever does murder that asshole it could very well be me. Or the man he works for. It d’pends.” 

  
“Wow very honest there, Jackson.” He snorted and shook his head. “I’m sorry we all assumed your life was great because you were rich. That your dad is an asshole.” He looked at Jackson and sighed. 

  
“I’m sorry you got accused of your father’s murder,” he said and shook his head. 

  
Stiles licked his lips nervously. “You don’t think I did it?” 

  
“Why would you? Your dad was great, he was all anybody could want. I may not have the brains to become something smart like a lawyer but I’m not so stupid I believe you did that.” Jackson said and drained his beer. “I’m gonna go get the shit kicked out of me for being poor. See you around turd.” He waved at him and Stiles waved back. 

  
Jackson believed him.

  
Scott didn’t. 

  
His life was weird to say the least and it fucking hurt that this is how it turned out. His kindergarten friend had a shitty abusive relationship with his father, and his best friend since birth doubted him more.

  
“So, old friend?” Derek sat down next to him and took a sip from his glass, some brownish liquid. Probably something fancy and bigshot like scotch or brandy. 

  
“We went to kindergarten and junior high together. He used to date my friend in high school too. I’m just gonna text her later.” He said.

  
“Are you okay?” Derek asked and placed two glasses of brown liquid next to them, and Stiles nodded and took a glass. 

  
“I’m fine. I just need to try to figure all this out. It hasn’t even been, what, 5 hours since I left the goddamned courthouse but I’m ready to ust lay down in a pile and give up.” 

  
“We’re going to figure this out. I talked to Erica. There’s been some noise in town of a criminal power exchange in Beacon Hills. I wouldn’t put it past these crazy crime lords to get rid of someone standing in their way, not even if it’s the sheriff. That just means it’s someone of a bit higher power rather than say the Calaveras. We just need to figure out who had the motives to do it. Why someone would need to get him gone.” Derek said with a calculated look on his face as he drained his whiskey. His cane lying on the bar neatly folded.

  
“Yeah, I know. But how the fuck do we do that!?” Stiles slumped back into his chair and Derek just shook his head and ordered him a second whiskey. 

 

♠ ♣ ♥ ♦

  
  
The next morning Stiles felt like the world was hanging upside down. And in hindsight he shouldn’t have asked on such a morning, but he still did. 

  
“How do you know all those things you know, like I can get the whole ‘I have good hearing’ because that’s usually gets enhanced when you lose another sense, but it doesn’t explain how I just found you hitting a boxing bag seven ways to Sunday like it was a ragdoll. No one is that strong. And all the crazy in my life cannot be worse than what makes that a thing, is it steroids, are you a superhero, are you…” 

  
“I’m a werewolf.” Derek said as a matter of fact, and Stiles snorted before he realized the man was serious. 

  
“What,” Stiles sat down and shook his head. No way. “STOP MESSING WITH ME AND TELL ME,” he shouted and almost fainted as Derek’s eyebrows disappeared and hair started sprouting from his jaw. He wasn’t proud to admit it but he might have fainted as his blind and handsome lawyer got wolfish features. He was just glad he didn’t get his head caught in the edge of a fucking table.

  
“I told you he was going to freak, considering all that’s happened to him. You should have waited.” He could hear Peter say as he woke slowly. His head throbbing. So much for making sure he didn’t hit it on some surface, like the goddamned marble coffee table. 

  
“Well, he asked and all of this smells like supernatural business anyway considering the sheriff dies and all of a sudden there are werewolves everywhere taking over the crime business, if I want him free from charges I need to come clean.” 

  
“What if he’ll misuse the information, what if he’s like her?” Peter stated, sounding angry. 

  
“He isn’t.” Derek said and left it at that. He pushed a bottle of water into Stiles hands and he sat up. “I know you’re awake.” 

  
“So supernatural hearing. Cool, cool. Cool.” He said and took a swig of water, wishing it was vodka. “Cool.” 

  
“Stop freaking out, you have met one of us before I gather. There isn’t really a shortage of them in Beacon City. We don’t bite.” Peter said and smirked at Stiles, fangs at the edge of his mouth. 

  
“I can’t believe this. Oh man. Did a werewolf kill my dad?” 

  
“Maybe, either that, something else with claws, or a sadist with a knife.” Peter said, he wasn’t one for sugar coating. 

  
“I think I’m going to puke. Am I crazy or is this true?” he asked just for good measure. 

  
“It’s true.” Derek said softly and smiled. 

  
“Wait, like I don’t know if you are like werewolf from lore but like can’t you guys heal like anything?” he asked and Derek made a grimace and sat down in the couch. He wasn’t wearing a suit now, but a pair of sweatpants and a Henley, a dark green one. Sexy. 

  
“Normally yes,” he said shortly and Stiles was afraid to ask, but he did it anyway. 

  
“How come you’re still blind, like didn’t the legendary bite cure that?”

  
“I got blinded when I was 16 and I’m born a wolf. The bite can only cure wounds, can’t regrow things from nothing, can’t cure things like cancer or neurological matters.” Derek said it all calmly but he took a few deep breaths in between sentences. “My eyes healed but the neurological centre in my brain didn’t. It’s uncommon but it happens. In order to heal it needs to make replicas from somewhere, when there is nothing to make replicated cells from we can’t heal.” He looked pained but Stiles knew no boundaries. 

 

“So, no regrowing arms?” he asked and Peter snickered as he shook his head. 

 

“No Stiles, no regrowing any limbs.”

  
“I’m sorry,” Stiles said in earnest. 

  
“That it happened or that you asked?” 

  
“Both, I can be insensitive,” he said and shrugged.

  
“It’s alright. I have good enough hearing to get by.”

 

“By that he means it’s like a new way to see. He’s very much like a bat in the sense of seeing.” 

  
“Cool. That’s actually cool.” Stiles sat up, his own sweats not nearly as cool as Derek’s. He were also wearing a t-shirt that had seen better days but he had no credit card and only Derek’s reject outfits at his disposal. Chinos and button ups. Jeeze. 

  
“Does that have anything to do with why you became a lawyer?” 

  
“Yes. I didn’t want to be before but then I felt like I needed to do something for the people like up, who couldn’t rely on the justice system completely, people with way to many secrets.” 

  
“Like werewolfism?” he asked. Derek rose an eyebrow and Peter sighed at his wording, but Derek nodded. “Lycanthropy whatever,” he added to not feel stupid. 

  
Peter left sometime during the afternoon and he and Derek sat in the couch, Derek seemingly reading through some documents in braille. How he got legal documents in braille was beyond Stiles but God, he was so thankful the super hearing werewolf knew he was innocent and had documents to read to prove it! 

  
“You could hear that I was telling the truth to Scott, couldn’t you?” 

  
“Yes. I’m sorry he didn’t believe you.” Derek said and Stiles believed that he actually was sorry. 

  
“It’s not fine so I’m not gonna say that, but it hurts less knowing there is a shit ton of evidence, because I always told him to stop being so gullible and start trusting evidence.” He laughed bitterly and Derek frowned. 

  
“The last thing I ever saw was how my family burned to death,” Derek said out of seemingly nowhere after a while of silence but Stiles didn’t say anything, he knew there was more. “I told the police officers questioning me after I got to my uncle’s who exactly did it. They didn’t believe me, there was no evidence of foul play, and our families had no connection whatsoever. There are things I couldn’t tell them, things I refused to tell anyone and they walked. It was ruled an electrical fire. I believe your dad was the only one who kept his file.”

  
“He did, but he never found anything. He didn’t have your statement in the file though. I never saw it.”

  
He paused before he continued. “You didn’t lose your sight in the fire? I just assumed. Sorry.”

  
“No I wasn’t in the fire, she made me watch as she lit the match and later when it was nothing but a husk she took my sight. Said I deserved that. Left me by the side of the road. The medics never found any fresh wounds on me and no one could explain how I got blinded, there were no trace of foul play. But she took everything I had,” he said and Stiles couldn’t help but  place a hand on his leg, show him he was there, he didn’t trust himself to speak, too sick from hearing Derek’s story. Derek just took a deep breath, squeezed his hand and smiled shakily. “I’m a lawyer for those the law enforcement cant help. Like you. They don’t know about the supernatural and can’t help you with those sort of problems, but we can.” He finished and Stiles knew he was right. For some reason he’d fallen right into the arms of the only two people who could help him figure this out. Hopefully they could do it outside the courtroom too. That place was proper scary! 

  
Peter must have had walked back in during it all because all of a sudden he spoke. Low and harsh, remembering making him angry and fuelled once more.

  
“What he’s trying to say is that we defend supes and we try to make sure the crime presented to the judge the most like it would have occurred if everyone was human. To make a fair trial. He defends them in court, spotting lies left and right. And I do the dirty work.” 

  
“What’s the dirty work?” 

  
“You don’t want to know, princess.” Peter smiled and Stiles snorted. No, he didn’t want to know.

  
“But I’m not supernatural,” he said, confused. 

  
“I only representant those who are innocent. You didn’t do it, you don’t deserve to go in for it either,” Derek said, and Stiles felt, he didn’t know what, but it was a good feeling. They hadn’t needed to help him, but they did, because they knew he was innocent. 

  
“I’m going to make pancakes. How about that?” 

  
“Yes,” both of them said and Stiles laughed all the way to the little kitchen. 

 

♠ ♣ ♥ ♦  
  
“We went to the crime scene.” Peter stated one afternoon and Stiles heart plummeted. Was this when they started to think he did it too? “At night obviously, don’t break out the dirty looks, Derek.” Derek just grunted and went back to listening to the radio. 

  
“There was scent of wolf.” Erica stated and Stiles let out a shaky breath. “Nothing else though, we brought some documents that the police hasn’t already taken and the safe-code we got from Stiles gave us these files,” she said and dumped some files on Derek’s desk. 

 

“Peter will read them through. I will make sure to see if I can track the scent of the wolf at the scene. But definitely a wolf, explains the amount of blood. I’m sorry, Stiles,” she said and gave him a squeeze on his shoulder. It felt better than most hugs in his life so he gladly took it. The comfort of an almost friend. 

  
“I’ll have to head out to Boyd’s, you guys wanna come, I feel like y’all can do with some drinks!” she said and the thick cloud of grief dissipated a little.   
  
Boyd was a gruff- and huge looking black man, who hugged him hello and got him a colourful drink. He was also a wolf, Stiles learned, and by that point he didn’t care anymore; he just drained his glass and asked for whiskey. Erica had the same idea as she sat and nursed a triple shot of whiskey, the poster girl of a Jack Daniel’s commercial with her blond curly hair and her leather jacket. The subject of the evening being ‘making Stiles understand how they differed from regular werewolves’. Erica kindly explained that not everyone could lift cars and he just nodded as Boyd huffed and kissed her. He knew Derek could hear exceptionally well and that Peter was, as he’d put it, “just fucking angry”. But the night there was the best he’d had since the tragedy. And that was damn nice.    
  


♠ ♣ ♥ ♦

  
Another week passed. Peter was gone to do some work as he did, the ‘no-one-knew-what-kind’. Derek told Stiles to calm down on an hourly basis and Stiles were never calm. They talked about werewolf things, and about what else existed, like banshees, druids, kanimas, harpies, sphinx and even fae. It was a lot to take in but why not add some more sprinkle of crazy on top of the disaster that was his life. He also couldn’t stop staring at Derek’s ass. He worked out, like a Greek god, and he looked like one too as he squatted or did sit ups. He didn’t know Stiles was staring, so no one could judge. 

  
“What do we need to get this going?!” he asked no one for the fifteenth time during the week. 

  
“WE got to give them an alternative to who did it because right now everything is pointing to you!” Derek rumbled for the umpteenth time and Stiles sighed.

  
“It’s driving me mad just staying here trying to figure out the impossible.”

  
Derek hummed and sighed. “The ADA will give us notice before any hearing. But until then you are going to have to stay here and try to just comply, I can’t have you running around and trying to find things out. It’s dangerous.”

  
“It’s dangerous for you three too!” he whined as he looked at the other two wolves in the apartment.

  
“We’re better equipped to deal with it, Stiles.” 

  
“Yeah yeah, super hearing bullshit. Who wants my dad out of the way? Wanted I mean. He sighed. “And why not kill me too? The only reason to keep me alive is if I have something they want.”

  
“Or they just want an easy scapegoat, you go down for this they can continue whatever plan they have.”

  
“Fuck.” Stiles got up from the couch and slammed his cup of coffee down onto the counter with a loud clang. 

  
“We can dance through this so many times but nothing changes until we’ve found alternative evidence. Until then you are the boy found with the murder-weapon at the crime scene with blood on you and no defensive wounds. We need to find connections between your father’s death and what’s happening in town. Because something is happening and I’m sure its related, but the question is how. Someone with power is changing the city from behind the scenes and no higher-ups are reacting. That could either be because it’s started here in Beacon Hills and they don’t care about this part of town or because they know exactly what’s happening.” 

  
“Rafael.” He said, shocked and silent.

  
“What,” Derek asked, he knew he’d heard him, him and his freakish hearing but he knew Derek wouldn’t know who he was.

  
“Rafael, my dad’s friend, his vice sheriff, they made the him sheriff now, what if he did it. He was always angry my dad got the elective position and not him. I never thought he’d- oh god.” He couldn’t breathe. What if he did it. His best friend’s father had sent someone to slaughter his dad? Had he? Because his dad never took an out, never took a dime from the bosses in Beacon Hills? He couldn’t breathe much less listen as Derek started to try to calm him down. He got up, tried to get to the door, he couldn’t breathe in here, he had to get out. Air. He needed air. He slumped to the door and panic showered over him so hard he fell over. All three wolves trying to get him up from the floor as he crumbled together. 

 

♠ ♣ ♥ ♦  
  


Stiles woke up with a headache and fuzzy memories of fainting like a damsel. Rafael. He had to get over to the desk. What were the documents in his dad’s safe? He knew it was the kind of cases he worked on at night with whiskey and a sharp mind, the kind of cases that included corrupt cops and internal investigation. Was Rafael a part of those files?! He started to move and his pillow groaned. He looked over his shoulder and found he’d been lying with his head in Derek’s fucking lap. Derek looked peaceful and calm as he slept, his hand loosely on Stiles shoulder. He needed to find an aspirin or something stronger, otherwise he would have stayed. Stayed and felt the comfort from the wolf as he snored softly, henley rolled up on his stomach and mouth slightly open. The picture of lazy Sunday mornings. It was a Wednesday afternoon still, he hoped, and Derek wasn’t a one night stand or a cozy boyfriend but his attorney. He sighed and rose, groaning as his head throbbed and his body felt raw. He needed to get perspective about this or he’d break. It had never felt like he was balancing on such a thin thread before and it scared him how easy he could fall straight into panic or grief at any moment. 

 

Derek roused and sat up to speak. “Hey, how are you feeling?” he asked and Stiles clenched his mind together willing every feeling to stop flowing, to stop swallowing him and washing him over in waves at the same time. 

 

“Like my best friend’s dad might have had my father killed,” he said and he could hear the tears in his voice. Fuck. “I hate being weak,” he mumbled mostly to himself.

 

“You are not weak, Stiles. You are standing here investigating a murder and handling it much better than I did when my family died,” Derek said and rose from the couch, the leather squeaking as he did. Stiles felt himself enveloped in a hug and let the tears stream.

 

“He’s fucking dead,” he sobbed and Derek just hugged him, “I can’t even go to his funeral, I can’t even say goodbye.” A soothing hand rubbed gentle circles on his back. 

“I know. I know,” Derek mumbled and Stiles knew Derek knew more than just the feeling of grief. He knew loss, murder, pain and all the other things currently flowing through Stiles.

 

“Will it ever get easier?” 

 

“No, but it gets manageable,” Derek said and Stiles nodded. They ended up back on the couch and Stiles felt himself drifting off slowly as Peter came back.

“Are you okay?” Peter asked as he placed a cup of coffee next to Stiles on the coffee table and it was more heartwarming than it should be, but it came from peter and he might not have known the man more than less than two weeks but living together gave him some insight to the man, and that man was nothing but enigmatic and angry, not uncaring just sheltered and tucked away from emotional distress.

 

Stiles cleared his throat from cry-mucus and snatched up the Mets mug. “I’m okay, but I need to know if my dad mentioned Rafael in his internal investigations files.” He swallowed the taste of bile and steeled himself for whatever he might find. 

 

“Care to elaborate what I’ll be looking for?” Peter asked as he picked up the files. 

 

Stiles bit his lip and he knew he shouldn’t be the one to  review the information or look at the things that could end up being evidence, lest it be thrown out in court because he was the one to bring it to attention or whatever. Stiles wasn’t the best at law studies but he knew it should be his lawyers or attorneys that should look at it. “Can I read them first?” He looked over at Peter who surprisingly smiled.

 

“I expected nothing less,” he said and smiled. “Here, you should mark relevant passages with these.” He reached for tiny sticky markers and Stiles took them along with the files from the table as he stood and walked out to the kitchen. He’d need a big table. 

  
“My dad was sure Rafael took bribes. It’s all here. Taking bribes, working with some of the gangs in Beacon Hills. I don’t know what to make of this? There is no proof but there is a lot of happenings that puts him in a very tight spot,” Stiles rambled to the older men. “But it looks like all he did he did for someone, I just can’t figure out why he’d try to bribe criminals for or why he’d take bribes from criminals when he wasn’t involved in whatever went on. He got money from a criminal for an investigation he was nowhere near working on, he couldn’t make any evidence disappear from behind the scenes if he didn’t even have access to the metaphorical opera house,” he continued and placed marker after marker on the table along string between the different casefiles. “He’s like the middle man of something and I’m not sure what, but he’s in every one of these files, doing strange things for no obvious reason, like renting a god damned warehouse. It was used for nothing at all, according to my dad’s notes.” He said it mostly to himself and the wolves seemed to understand that because they let him come to his own conclusions on his own. Which were none. 

 

“You’ll make yourself crazy continuing like that. We’ll find something. Peter will look through it too. Now, I made chicken curry,” Derek said and pulled on Stiles arm gently. “That is unless  _ someone _ rearranged the spices again. Pray it isn’t cayenne. You are eating it anyway,” he said grumpily but there was a smile tugging on his lips. Stiles hoped it was curry. He didn’t much tolerate too spicy food. 

 

The next morning Stiles dragged himself down the hall but got about half way before he stopped and gently sneaked down towards the reception room.

 

“Derek, Stiles’ father was after all on the top tier in the city, would Rafael risk that? He’s clearly involved, but how is more important than why right now. He’s the key but I do not think he murdered him,” Peter said and Stiles stood still around the corner listening in, knowing the wolves probably knew he was there. “There are feral wolves popping up all over the city, it’s getting dangerously close to become an outing of our species and I can’t help thinking that it’s connected,” he said, his eyebrows knitted together and a glass of whiskey in his hand. They sat both in the leather couch and Stiles heart ached for family. Derek just nodded. 

 

“We need to find out where these wolves are coming from,” he stated and Peter agreed wholeheartedly. 

 

“Away I go once more, nephew, I’ll be back when I find something. Keep watch over each other,” he said as he rose and made his way over to Stiles. Peter patted him on the shoulder before taking a duffel bag that was nudged into a corner by the entrance and disappeared out the door. 

 

“So, just you and me for a while again, huh?” Stiles said nervously and Derek smiled. 

“It will be nice. I’ll cook something and I think you need a night where there’s nothing on your mind other than relaxing.” Before Stiles could tell him that he usually needed a whiskey to relax, Derek wrinkled his eyebrows and spoke. “And no Stiles, whiskey is not a relaxing thing to do. We’re going to the museum, or the aquarium. Your pick,” he said and Stiles knew there was no arguing so he just grunted out a yes sir and Derek smirked. 

 

The aquarium was amazing and Stiles had a better time than he thought. Somehow there was so much more guilt that it was starting to get harder enjoying life than he initially thought possible. He looked at the seahorses and remembered his mom, her smile, her laugh and her ability to calm him down from anything, just a warm hug and a soothing voice telling him everything would be alright, he felt the tears threaten to escape and Derek clamped his hand around his shoulder and pulled him into a hug. 

 

“How’d you know i was sad?” he mumbled, and Derek just shook his head. 

 

“You smelled miserable and like tears,” he sighed into his ear and Stiles hummed. 

 

“What does misery smell like?” he asked even though he didn’t want to know the answer. 

 

Derek’s face twisted into something akin to a child seeing broccoli. “Like sour apples gone bad.” 

 

Stiles hummed and pulled his own arm around Derek, returning the hug in front of the seahorses and clownfish. “What do I smell like otherwise?” 

 

“Thunderstorms and cinnamon.” Derek smiled and Stiles couldn’t help but to do the same considering Derek looked so goddamn fine when he was happy. 

 

♠ ♣ ♥ ♦  
  


Derek walked out his bedroom and stopped halfway down the hall before he turned around seemingly having forgotten anything in his rush. 

 

“I promise I’ll fix this, I will! Something has happened that make the want to start the trial ahead of date,” he said and Stiles slumped together on the couch. 

 

“What?” he asked with a shaky voice, he could feel his whole body getting warm. 

 

“I don’t know yet. I’ll call you when i find out!” he promised before he folded out his cane and went out the door. His glasses perched on his nose.

 

 

  
Stiles phone rang a few hours later and he jumped to get to it as fast as he could. “Derek? What is going on?” He was halfway to panic and Derek’s sigh on the other end of the line didn’t help. 

 

“The sheriff’s son is missing,” he said and Stiles blood froze. Scott. What happened to Scott?

“You think it’s connected? Someone kills my father and kidnaps Scott?” he asked frantically. 

 

“Well, yes, everyone thinks it’s connected, problem is that most of the people involved in this are only seeing you as the common connector. The opposition wants to get your bail null and void and get you back to jail, they are convinced you are responsible.” Derek explained it all very apologetically but Stiles barely listened. What the fuck had he gotten into?

 

“So what’s going to happen?” he asked, scared the answer would be that they’d send him off to jail. 

 

“Nothing as of now, Judge Yukimura stood by her decision of bail with the fact that you haven’t moved out of your designated area. I think she knows more than she lets on. She smells too much of electricity to be entirely human but I can’t be sure. I think she wants to help though. She is buying us time to find something and make a case but I don’t think she can keep the opposition away from pushing the hearing up for much longer. It’s been a few months and they are getting more and more agitated.” Derek had a calm voice and even hearing him saying things looked grim he got calmer from hearing him speak.

 

Stiles didn’t know what to say to that. “I hope he is okay,” he said instead and Derek made a sound of agreement. 

 

“Me too, Stiles, I know he was your friend, but him being missing is making our case harder.” 

 

Stiless just let out a weak yes and hung up. He needed to nap, then he needed to find whatever he could on what was going on in this town. 

 

Derek came home a few hours after he’d called Stiles, the practice closed and dark and the living area almost the same, since Stiles hadn’t bothered to get up and turn on a light. He could hear the elevator move and knew it was Derek when it stopped at their floor, considering there were two apartments on the floor, the practice and their home, albeit temporarily for Stiles. He sighed as he heard the doors close again and only a quick knock on the door. He rose and got half way there before he turned weary, Stiles remembered seeing Derek take his keys this morning so why would he knock. He peeked out the frosted window and gasped before he threw it open. Derek was a mess, a bloody, beaten mess and Stiles was panicking. 

 

“Stop panicking and help me in, Stiles!” Derek growled and Stiles just nodded dumbly at the blind man before he tried his best to half carry and half drag Derek inside.

 

“What happened?!” he shouted and Derek winced as he was moved. 

 

“Feral wolves, several. They trashed Boyd’s bar, Erica and Boyd are still there and Peter is on his way there too. Fuck. They were looking for you.” Derek breathed harshly and Stiles gagged at the sight of so much blood. 

 

Stiles dumped Derek on the couch, trying his damn hardest to not rouse his wounds before he threw up in a corner. Derek groaned as he hit the soft surface and Stiles winced. 

 

“Stiles you need to inflate my lung.” He was almost completely torn to shreds and while he was healing rapidly there were apparently some things he couldn’t heal himself without help and Stiles refused to stick his hand in his ribcage and inflate a god damn lung.

 

“Hell no!” he shrieked. “What do you want me to do, use a straw?!” Derek just growled at him, fangs almost piercing his lip as he winced at the sudden pain. Erica wasn’t answering her phone, busy stopping of the flow with feral werewolves so he did he only thing he could think of instead. He called Melissa.    
  
She answered after the first ring sounding frantic. 

  
“Stiles? Are you okay? How are you?” she hurried as if she was scared he’d hang up on her.

  
"Can i trust you right now to not go to Rafael or Scott about this?" he asked, not really keen on knowing the answer. Turns out she wasn’t like her family, Stiles always knew but he still had his doubts.

  
"... Yes, you're like a son to me Stiles." Stiles didn’t know what to say but he felt tears threatening to fall.  "I don’t know what got into the two idiots inside, but I know you wouldn’t do what they say you did. End of discussion." She sounded confident and Stiles smiled.

  
He took a deep breath. "Then i need your help." 

 

She let out a breath of relief "Of course. I won’t tell them."

  
"Good, they wouldn’t like it. Bring your first aid kit to my lawyers’ office,” he said and gave Melissa the address. 

 

"I'll find it. I love you Stiles." She said hesitantly and Stiles smiled.

  
"Love you too. Please hurry?” 

 

“I will son! Cover the wound with towels or sheets, make sure the bleeding stops.”

 

“Yes ma’am!” he said before he hung up.

He had Melissa.

  
He had Derek. 

  
Sometimes he had Peter and apparently two other crazies. Maybe even Jackson. But no Scott. And that still stung.   
  
“Derek is hurt pretty bad,” Stiles said in panic as Melissa came through the door. 

 

"Oh my, Stiles is he dead?" she asked as she looked down at the barely breathing man on the sofa.

  
"I fucking hope not, just help him!" he said and Melissa stared at him. “Please.” he added and she smiled before she rushed to unpack he bag.

  
"Alright i love you but get out of the way now!" she said as she assessed the damages done to Derek.

 

"They are getting close, get that straw in me now!" Derek gritted as Melissa poked and prodded at him, doing things Stiles couldn’t describe in a million years. 

 

“It’s not a straw, sweetheart, it’s a tube and this is going to hurt!” she said as she lined it up with the hole she just made in the gorgeous man. “Here goes!” she said and plunged the tube into him. He roared and Stiles was afraid Melissa would panic and run but her eyes just widened before she took a few deep breaths and looked at Stiles. “I don’t understand this, and you  _ will _ tell me Stiles!” 

 

He just nodded frantically as Derek seemed to heal up properly now.

 

“This is going to go quick, so don’t panic, I panicked but you’re mature, Melissa, I can’t have you panicking,” he said as Derek ripped the tube out as he could breathe properly again. 

Stiles heard something slam into a car, screaming and a car alarm that beeps like hell was on fire. Erica was finally on her way to the apartment. 

  
Melissa was stitching Derek up after uncollapsing his lung when she ran in with Peter in tow, Boyd climbing through the window without so much a scratch.

  
"Get ready, boys, they are coming!" Erica grinned. Melissa let out a squeak as Erica lifted the entire filing cabinet and set it in front of the door. "Stiles, you want to hide now with the lady."

  
"Fuck no, I want to see who the cowardly bitches trying to kill me are!" he snarled

  
“Then the two of you stay back because here they come,” Erica said as the door budged inwards but didn’t break, the cabinet in the way. Derek grunted as he rose but seemed eons better now that his healing had gotten some help. The first wolf crashed through the door as the filing cabinet after a lot of huffing and puffing moved out of the way.   
One, a bulky man with disgusting nails, went for Peter, who roared in his face and went for the kill right away. The wolf dodged and Peter’s rage grew. Erica punched another so hard he flew out one of the windows and after the crash the alarm from earlier stopped. Boy, was that cool. Derek fought like he wasn’t blind, dodging and parrying every move made his way.

  
"Sit down, you have a collapsed lung!" Melissa shrieked and Stile suppressed a giggle at her motherly tendencies. 

 

"Not any more,” he grunted and threw a bat over to the two of them. Stiles picked it up as it rolled towards his feet, letting it rest in his hands just as a wolf ran towards them. He took a breath and swung his bat as the enormous man stopped dead in his tracks as the bat broke on his head. Erica was on him in a matter of seconds after that. 

 

“Pick on someone in your own size, Ennis!” she snarled, and threw Derek’s armchair on him. 

 

“You freaks are an abomination to our kind!” he sputtered as he ripped through the chair to get out from under it. 

 

“Yeah yeah, freak abilities yadda yadda. Come fight!” she roared and let her claws out, her face twisting, and Ennis did the same as he ran towards her. They collided in a bloody heap and the sound of the fight must have woken the entire building. Peter was nowhere to be seen but Stiles estimated he was the one outside fighting of the incoming wolves if the sound of car alarms and roars were anything to go by. Boyd stood and grinned as a female wolf tried to slice through him but nothing happened. He retaliated but she was good, fighting him with every ounce of power she could muster. Stiles turned just in time to see Derek rip the throat out from the wolf beneath him with his teeth before he lunged on the one called Ennis, now pinning Erica to the floor, she snarled and fought him but he was massive. Derek threw him off and got ready to attack as Stiles saw Melissa undo the safety on her gun. She fired at the large man and Derek took the opportunity to dig his hand into the man’s chest. Literally ripping him apart. Melissa squeezed her eyes shut at the sight and Stiles, not very proud of it, fell into a heap on the floor as the world turned dark. 

 

♠ ♣ ♥ ♦  
  
“I found something,” Peter said as he entered the office. Stiles groaned on the sofa, the sun was up already and he hated being woken up like this, why did he always faint?! It had been a crazy couple of days. Werewolf fights, feral werewolves trying to rip his throat out, hangovers and an upcoming court date. Could he get a break?! He’d sat and scoured every inch of the internet to try to find some information about the gangs in town but he found zero, nada, none whatsoever. And if it was a werewolf thing he wasn’t surprised it wasn’t showing up on the internet. He’d research during the days, Derek would come back home, pour him a drink and hug him, he’d maybe cry a little and then he’d fall asleep. Lather, rinse, repeat. 

  
“What?” Erica asked, and Peter grinned. Melissa was still there, looking calm and collected and Stiles envied her ability to stay calm.

  
“Deucalion. My contact says he’s back. _ I’d  _ say he’s behind this.” Peter said and Erica looked about as pale as a sheet as Peter lunged for the booze. “I never said it was good, just that I found it,” he explained and Derek grunted. As per usual. 

  
“Who’s Deucalion?” Stiles shivered as he looked at Erica.

  
“We’re in a war now, Stiles, and you fell into the center of it. I thought Ennis jumped ship when Deuc disappeared but if he’s still with him we have a problem. That means they are all here, Deucalion included. Deucalion may be a cautionary tale for wolves but that doesn’t mean he’s any less real. Stay away from him. I'm not going to lie. Prison is safer than him,” Erica said as she strode out of the room, she came back only seconds later with a bottle of whiskey, the one Stiles wasn’t allowed to drink from because it contained wolfsbane and could kill him. Derek was the only one who didn’t look shocked. 

  
“What does she mean, wolves. Did she call herself a wolf?! And who is this man, did he kill your father?” Melissa shouted as the two men sat still looking at Stiles. “Are you werewolves?” she asked and made an ‘aha’ kid of sound and Derek just nodded, looking a little bit dumbfounded that she figured it out.

 

“That man is a crazy legend come true. And yes, we are werewolves,” Erica said and shrugged.

  
“Alright,” Melissa said and took a deep breath. Stiles was almost angry she took it so well when he hadn’t but she had the patience for him his entire life, for 23 years she’d seen some shit, so he wasn’t actually surprised. “You are werewolves, and so is this Deucalion man?” Derek was about as shocked at her taking these news well as Stiles was. 

  
“Well, yes,” Peter said. “The demon wolf. Not only is he a  bit on the crazy side, he’s also immensely powerful. Hungry for power and hungry for domination. He’s what all the James Bond movies are made of, the one who wants world domination. Except he’s actually crazy enough to try and powerful enough to maybe pull it off.” 

  
“Shit. That’s scary,” Stiles said. “Why does he want to start here though?” 

  
“Because this was his city, back when pack was a necessity this was the territory he couldn’t take. After the fire, there was no family with ultimate claim anymore, considering there only were three of us. He wants this because he couldn’t have it and because it’s an open territory for everyone. Also because it’s the city with the broadest ways out of here crime wise. It’s a good starting point. It lays upon what we call ley-lines, if he gains power here, it will amplify and he’ll have power anywhere. The ley-lines are collecting here, they’re like roots of the supernatural, if he control the cluster he controls all the branches.” Peter continues and Erica nods solemnly.

 

“He’s a dangerous man. It explains the wolves and I should have seen it, I should have,” Erica said in panic as Boyd looked more and more scared. 

 

“It’s not on you Erica. We thought he was dead.” Boyd comforted her and pulled her tight to his chest.

 

“He keeps wolves, newly bitten, born it doesn’t matter, in crates for months sometimes, deprives them completely of the moon, he unleashes them on the world like berserkers and lets them do the damage where he guides them towards. I’d say it’s Beacon Hills this time.” he continued matter of factly and Stiles gaped at the revelation. This wasn’t a robber or some low life criminal boss; this was a living nightmare.

 

“How do you know all this?” he asked and Boyd shook his head, so he didn’t push. After a while Erica answered and he wished she hadn’t.

 

She took a swig out of the bottle of whiskey. “He did it to us.”

 

♠ ♣ ♥ ♦  
  
_I have something I think you’ll want. I’m coming over._ – Jackson 

 

Stiles read the message fifteen times and then some more before he grasped the fact that Jackson was probably trying to help. 

 

Jackson knocked on the practice door fifteen minutes after he sent the message and looked disheveled on a completely different level. 

 

“So, i was at the monthly money call to my father,” he started and Stiles just shut the door behind him. 

 

“You don’t get thrown around by Erica anymore?” Stiles snorted and Jackson looked unimpressed by his question.

 

“Nah she quit and I’m just gonna end up there every month anyway so might as well just get there on my own. My ironical poverty is not the point,  _ Stilinski _ . The point is my father talked about McCall which I find very suspicious considering he’s fucking missing. He said something about a Duke and the “McCall boy being a collateral in case something happens.” Considering he also mentioned your case and Scott being missing as a very unfortunate thing for “the young Stilinski”, I thought I’d tell you. If you get cleared, just make sure to drop my dad’s name when they asked who was involved in framing you,”  he said and took the glass of water Stiles offered him. 

 

“Would you be okay telling Derek this?” Stiles asked, he knew it could be vital for his case as it showed that something was going on. “We could use it as some sort of evidence that there are bigger things in play,”  he continued and Jackson nodded and put the empty glas down. 

“I’ll testify if you need me too,” he said and Stiles knew Jackson was doing this mostly for his own agenda in his feud against his father and less to help Stiles, but in the end it did help Stiles and he was happier about that than he was upset that once again Jackson only thought about himself. 

 

Jackson told Derek and the older man just nodded and hummed as he recorded the statement. 

 

“We could get this to the judge almost straight away as evidence, we’d have to argue that it was too sensitive with a risk of tampering to get it to count without having it processed by police. Considering Jackson’s father is a DA and has an in with the department I’d say that her accepting this a valid proof of disinvolvement in Stiles’ case.

  
“My father hasn’t given up his little money mission with me. He’s obviously involved in crime and more importantly, I think he works for some guy called Duke. Your father wouldn’t budge an inch if someone were to take over an entire god damned city. He’d make it a god damned uproar. But Rafael would, and my father would because all they care about is power and money,” he said and Stiles sighed. He felt ashamed to admit to himself he wished it had been something easy as a break in, that he could have answers right away about what happened to his father and who did it. But he knew nothing. He couldn’t even go to his funeral and there was no body to bury.    
  


After Jackson had left, with Derek’s number and a warning to stay safe and don’t engage with his father too much Stiles fell into the couch and sighed. 

 

“How are you feeling?” Derek asked and Stiles knew he was being kind, caring but he couldn’t help the annoyance breaking through. 

 

“It’s been months now, and I’m cooped here in a city where there is alarms and break ins more often than not, with an ankle bracelet, having to look at your stupidly good looking ass!” and that was not what he was mad about at all but that was what he said.

 

“Tell me Stiles, how does it look?”  Derek smirked and Stiles wanted to punch him.

 

“Ridiculously amazing. It’s the definition of a bubble butt. It makes me angry looking at you!” he mumbled and Derek’ laugh rang out loud and clear in the apartment and Stiles smiled happily. Albeit looking like a tomato, he hadn’t meant to say any of that out loud. Derek didn’t stop smiling so Stiles punched him in the arm and he laughed again, making Stiles frustrated not only in the angry way but also the sexual way. Fuck it all he thought before he pressed into Derek’s side and closed his eyes. 

 

“Can I sit here for a while?” he asked and Derek hummed in agreement as he threw an arm around him, cuddling him close. They woke up the next morning with stiff and sore necks and Stiles sported a really awkward morning stiffy, but he could also feel that Derek was caught in a similar state so he just excused himself and rushed out of the room.

 

At breakfast he stared shamelessly at Derek and no one could stop him. 

 

“You think Deucalion has Scott like he had Erica and Boyd? Or just at a means to an end to make sure Rahael behaves?” 

 

“I don’t know Stiles, i truly don’t know,” he said and hug his head a little. 

 

“Hey, we’ll fix it all, we’re a wonderful team!” Stiles grinned and Derek smiled at him. 

 

“I just wish I could do more.” 

 

“I get that, Derek, I wish I could do more too. All the time.” 

 

♠ ♣ ♥ ♦  
  


Erica looked over at him and gaped. “Say that again.” 

 

He repeated himself, “I said I can’t figure out why Raphael would rent a warehouse.”

 

“Deucalion! Stiles, he needs to keep his wolves somewhere. If we find that, we might find the wolf who Deucalion sent to murder your father! Idiot, you should have told me sooner!” she grunted and swung her leather jacket on.

 

“Well come on!” 

 

“It’s outside my range,” he protested weakly and looked at the bulky and thick ankle monitor.

 

Erica sighed but leered like a cat. “Well hope to god we find the murderer then. Or something worth reporting. At the very least.”

 

“Derek is going to kill us! This isn’t going to help my case and I literally won’t survive in prison, they think I killed the top cop!” he whined.

 

“That will make you king of the yard, brother, just trust me. Can you?” she asked. 

 

“Yeah, yeah I can.” 

 

“Stiles I want you to now I might be wrong but I think he might be alive,” she said calmly, her face stony and pulled together. 

 

“Wha, what? How?” 

 

“Deucalion likes nothing better than to rub his winnings in someone’s face, having the sheriff that never budged to his demands at his beck and call would be exactly something he’d do. I need you to understand that it might not be this way. I was with Deucalion for years, Stiles, I know how he works but this is all built on what we already know, if we got it wrong somewhere...” she trailed off, but Stiles understood the risks. He could be alive, but he probably wouldn’t be and Stiles needed to be prepared that all they had on Deucalion was dead wrong. At this point he didn’t care though. The opposition wanted his head for the murder and the evidence against him were piled up in a mountain. He’d seen Derek’s face as he worked through the files. He was staring at a pretty long prison stay. Finding his father or finding his murderer was the only chance Stiles had at this point. 

 

“You think he’s there? At the warehouse?” he asked, his lips in a thin line as if it kept all of him together by clenching them tightly. 

 

“Yes, it’s the only place left where Deucalion could be and he run things tight, nothing or no one in his employment or his denture is ever scattered unless he says so, we know the feral wolves all go somewhere but not where, we know he keeps them both in check and also has the space to deprive them of moonlight or pack interaction.” 

 

“He’s torturing his own? But I thought he valued his own kind more, wanting to get rid of humanity and yadda yadda,” Stiles asked as Erica started to move.

“He doesn’t care about his own, he cares about power and being the one with the power, being on top of the food chain, his own he couldn’t care less about unless they are equally matched,” she said. 

 

“But no one is,” Stiles stated and Erica nodded and she made her way down the stairway to the garage, he followed and knew this was it. 

 

He left for the warehouse: he got picked up by cops. He got picked up. “Erica!” he shouted before she could answer. “I get picked up.” 

 

“What?” she looked confused. Before she got it. “You clever, clever boy… “ she said and leered again, they ran for the bike and Stiles swallowed his nervosity before he sat down behind Erica and she revved the engine.  If Deucalion had cops on his payroll, he’d be damned if it wouldn’t be those who came to collect Stiles. Raphael would most likely be the one. And Stiles would be bait.

 

“Once me and the others get in, make sure to stay out and keep an eye out for your father or anything that can be useful. Peter and Boyd are on their way, Derek too, we will handle Deucalion as well as Kali and the twins. You focus on staying alive, keep the gun loaded and be ready to use it, Stiles.” He just nodded, not trusting his voice at this time. 

 

“Erica, what a pleasure to see you!” a booming British voice carried through the warehouse. “It’s been so long!” A tall man stepped out of the shadows like a cliched villain and Stiles hid a snort. 

 

“Deucalion,” Erica said, lips pressed tight and lowered her eyes in respect. He seemed pleased. 

 

“Just out of curiosity, shouldn’t you be in jail?” Deucalion asked as he took a step forward towards Stiles. He was wearing an armani suit, his hair expertly laid back. If he hadn’t been a psychopath Stiles might have thought him hot. He was hot but the level of psycho Erica had told him about made him flinch as he drew closer. 

 

“Well, you know, werewolf lawyers helped, that and the fact that a bad case of framed for murder doesn’t really keep me pliable and submissive.” He shrugged and Erica grinned in his peripheral vision. He clenched his fists, equally scared as he was angry. This man was the one responsible for his father’s death.

 

“Where ley-lines cross the supernatural is stronger, this city isn’t called Beacon City for no reason kid.” Deucalion leered as he paced, Stiles felt himself become nervous, they had just barged in here, Derek wasn’t here yet, Peter wasn’t either and neither was Boyd. He knew Erica could fend for herself, but he couldn’t and she was about as scared as he was. A wolf appeared behind Erica, slamming her into the ground, her head making a cracking sound as it hit the concrete. 

 

“Now, Stiles, here’s a seat for you,” Deucalion said and pulled up a chair for him, “please take a seat, I’ll let you stay for the entire show, starting with your little friends.” he smiled predatory and Stiles did as he was told. Erica being thrown onto another chair, her hands chained to it. Deucalion took his time tying the knots to keep Stiles in place. “If there ever was a place to start. Then this is it!” he roared and Stiles shivered. 

 

“And what would that be?” he heard Peter ask and he breathed a bit easier. 

 

“Well,  _ Hale, _ pest-control.” Deucalion mused smoothly before he attacked. Peter was in a rage as he snarled and fought Deucalion and Stiles saw Derek launch for Kali. He couldn’t really move from where he sat and he felt his heart clench as he saw Derek hit the concrete floor hard enough to dent. At least Stiles had a gun on his waist when he got free. At least he had a gun. 

 

Derek ran towards Stiles and undid the ropes binding him down, Erica starting to waking up from the harsh blow, ripping the chains clean off.. Derek let out a frustrated yell as he punched a hole in the concrete wall beside them. “He’s gone,” he growled. “He must’ve gone further down, there is no up or no out. We need to find him!” he continued and Boyd nodded as his body knitted together from Deucalion’s wounds. Kali layed disturbingly still at the floor, head in a position impossible for  a living being. Stiles gulped as he thought about her snapped neck.

 

“I found them!” he heard Boyd yell as he threw the last remaining pieces of rope off himself. His head shot towards Boyd so hard he heard his neck crack. He knew Erica told him both in a way to get revenge on Deucalion and make him come with but also because she genuinely knew him, but he didn’t dare hope his dad was actually alive. People flooded out after Boyd as he led them from the building. No Sheriff.

 

“Call Satomi, make sure she can take as many as possible to train, we’ll do the same.” Derek said before Peter and Deucalion came crashing through the wall. Stiles noticed a kid almost throwing himself away as his fear increased at the sight of the two men wolfed out and fighting with claws sharper than scalpels. His blond hair flopping on his head and a dirty scarf around his throat, he looked scared as he threw himself behind Boyd before he disappeared out of sight. Stiles would have to worry about that later. Peter took a harsh swipe of claws to his stomach and Derek roared before he dragged Peter rom Deucalion’s grasp and took aim at his throat.

 

“Stiles.” the voice was faint and strained but made Stiles shiver and turn cold. Scott was looking at him like he’d gutted him. “I’m sorry. Th-there were, were monsters. I never thought. I didn’t- didn’t  _ know.  _ I thought it was  _ you,” _ he stuttered and Stiles couldn’t deal with this. He heard tired screech at the entrance and he knew who to anticipate. ‘ _ I thought you were the monster’  _ maybe that wasn’t exactly what Scott meant but it was what Stiles heard.

 

“Scott, get away from him!” Raphael said as he charged forward towards them, Stiles pulled the gun from his waisted and aimed it at the Sheriff. 

 

“You framed me for MURDER!” he shouted and Raphael stopped dead in his tracks. “It was your idea, wasn’t it, when they wanted him gone, why kill me too, why not use me to get away with it. Twist me into something horrible, something dark, void of emotions and incapable of feeling. You made me into  _ you!” _ he shouted with such anger that Raphael looked scared, he was so angry, so full of grief but his hand was steady and Raphael knew it.

 

“Stiles, put the gun down. That’s my dad!” Scott pleaded.

 

Stiles clenched his other hand hard, as hard as he could to not pull the trigger. “What about mine Scott? WHAT ABOUT MY DAD? The one your dad betrayed, planned his murder, whom he framed me for murdering?!” He felt his self control let go and he was just angry, he didn’t care about what it meant to kill the sheriff for real. Peter staggered up beside him, a calming presence. “But don’t worry,  _ Scotty, _ I won’t shoot your father. I’m better than that. I have enough at home to get him incarcerated. Enough that he’ll want to confess to ease the burden,” he half lied and half spoke out of truth. He did have a lot on Raphael, but not enough to actually build a case, but Raphael was power hungry and stupid, when he fell, he’d turn into a coward, like every other power hungry man. He’d fold, or do something rash like try to kill him, but either way he’d end up in jail, if not for being a coward, then for shooting a 23 year old in front of witnesses.

 

“No!” Scott said and moved between them. Erica snarled as Scott’s eyes shimmered gold. 

 

“You do realize that the only reason you’re in this mess, become what you so kindly called “a monster” is because your daddy over there handed you over as collateral, to prove he was trustworthy. You’re a tool for him to use,” Peter spoke and Scott shook his head in denial. He turned to look at his father but the older man just starred uncaringly forward. Stiles could hear Derek and Deucalion fight still but he wasn’t scared, he’d seen Derek fight, the man might be blind but he knew every weak spot there was to know about his opponents.

“It’s not true, right, dad?” Scott asked and for the first time that evening Stiles saw the frightened kid who was raised with the same fear of losing his dad as Stiles was, Scott was scared, but still very, very stupid. Raphael said nothing instead he leered at Peter. 

 

“I couldn’t have been where I am without Deucalion, I’d do anything for him,” he said and flashed his eyes at Peter. Fucking werewolves. 

 

“You let them make me a monster.” Scott was panicking and his claws popped as his jaw became hairier. Erica jumped in between father and son before they could start tearing each others throats out. If what Erica said was any indication to what Scott would be used as, he was being deprived of whatever control he needed to stay human so when Erica knocked him out and carried him towards the others Stiles didn’t object. 

 

“You’re sick,” he said instead to Raphael and the man laughed. 

 

He looked at Stiles with disgust. “No, I’ve been shown what the stronger species are, Stiles! Your father would never understand and Deucalion knew that, so he made a decision based on my recommendation.” Stiles raised his gun again. “Without him, and with me in charge I’d let him through, make him powerful, make him our leader, Stiles.” Stiles always knew the man was weird and had his ticks, but this was a full blown psychosis. He charged for Stiles, knocking Boyd over in the process, before he could reach him, Peter had torn his throat out. 

He heard a howl of pain before Deucalion let Derek fall like a sack of sand to the floor, his side bloody and oozing blood in a steady stream. 

 

“Boys, girl. Let’s get one thing clear. I’m doing this for our species, well, not yours Mr.Stilinski, and obviously not the Hale boy here, being a blind werewolf, weak, a disgrace,” he said and kicked the man while he was down. ”Why should we live in the shadows?  _ WE _ shouldn’t fear humans, they need to fear  _ us _ ,” he said and he seemed so sure of himself that it scared Stiles. There was a rumble from below and Deucalion positively glowed with happiness. “They have been down there for quite a while now and I did promise they’d get to come out today when we got guests. I figured you’d come eventually. Always been lovers of humans and protectors of the territory.” Stiles looked around and as long as Deucalion stood directly above Derek no one seemed to dare move. Stiles held his breath. He couldn’t lose Derek too, he couldn’t lose everyone he cared about. Three wolves burst through the door and came at them, Peter quick to act and throw them off as they jumped. Stiles ducked the best he could, he felt one of them graze his side and he yelped as he attempted to slide under a engine looking thing in a corner. He collided with the ground just feet away from ‘safety’ and he groaned as he rolled around. Heavy weight on top of him. Deucalion smiled down on him as he raised a clawed hand. He started to scramble for the gun and Deucalion laughed and tutted. “You dropped it, little human.” 

 

He’d dropped the gun, and now he’d die. There was a loud roar and Deucalion fell to the side as one of his own wolves drove a clawed hand into his back. 

 

“Dad?” Stiles didn’t dare hope as he scrambled away from Deucalion's body and the wolf standing above it. He could see that it was his dad, but he didn’t want to assume he was alright or even himself. The former sheriff snarled and charged at him, Derek barely making it in time to slam Noah into the ground and incapacitate him, Stiles was crying, he was in shock, cold and shaking as he looked at the beaten man resembling his dad. Derek looked apologetic, holding the feral wolf down. 

 

“Stiles, I know it’s hard, and it’s a lot. But you need to back off a little.” Derek said as Noah thrashed below him, snarling and snapping his jaw at him. 

 

“What, no!”

 

“If you don’t he will try to kill you. GO,  _ NOW _ !” Derek roared and Stiles ran out of the building, collapsing in a bush just outside, his breathing harsh and quick. His head was swimming, with pictures of his dad with months worth of beard, months worth of beatings and depravity of the only thing that now could give him control. He was alive. 

 

He was alive. 

 

He felt Erica beside him, her hands caressing him as he curled together in the bush and cried. Cried because someone hurt his father, because someone hurt him too. Cried because Deucalion had hurt so many of the people he’d grown to love and he cried because he hadn’t murdered his dad. Because his dad was alive. 

 

Derek came out a few minutes later, his father in his arms. There was blood on his temple but Stiles tried not to worry. He got up, his legs shaking as he made his way over to Derek in the now almost empty parking lot. 

 

“What now?” he asked shakily. Please don’t say he needs to die. 

 

“We need to train him, give him an anchor, something that keeps him human. It’s going to take time, Stiles, but Peter has done this before, Erica and Boyd will help too,” he said and Erica nodded.

 

“We’ll help however you can,” she said. “Let’s get you guys home.” Stiles nodded and jumped into the car next to his father. 

 

“You guys go, I’ll make sure there isn’t any evidence of wolfboys.” Peter said and Stiles wondered silently if the cloud of smoke he could see from the hospital room his dad ended up in was from Peter’s hiding of evidence.

 

♠ ♣ ♥ ♦  
  


Turns out it was. The building burnt down, and the official statement was that Stiles got kidnapped by his father's kidnappers, was found by his friends and lawyers and saved from the building before it burnt down.

 

“I can’t believe you are alive,” he said as his father woke up. Melissa next to the bed on the other side from Stiles. She’d helped Derek calm him down while he regained his control and human mind. Apparently there were some sketchy use of aconite too, but as long as his dad was fine in the end he didn’t care. 

 

“You’d do fine without me, kid.” he said and Stiles knew it was meant to calm his mind but it did just the opposite. The loneliness and pain he'd felt as he was almost charged for his father’s murder simmered up to the surface.

 

“Without you here I’d be in jail, Dad. They thought I killed you,” he cried and Melissa excused herself silently before slipping out the door. The only sound was the sound of the heart monitor as his father stared at him in disbelief.  

 

“No, no, you wouldn’t they know that!” he shook his head in denial and Stiles sniffled as he lay down beside his dad on the hospital bed. 

 

“I’m just glad you’re alive. I thought they killed you.” 

 

“Raphael?” his father asked and Stiles nodded. 

 

“I’m glad he’s dead if he tried to frame you for my murder,” he said and Stiles knew he meant it. They fell asleep like that and no one bothered then until Melissa had to administer more calming wolf juice.

 

♠ ♣ ♥ ♦  
  


Raphael was revealed officially as the one responsible for both kidnappings and attempted murders. Jackson told the court how his father had spoken about Raphael and Scott when the latter had just gone missing, Jackson was testifying against his dad with a smile on his face. He’d taken it very well when Peter threatened to rip his dick off if he spoke any words about Deucalion, so he didn’t. He just told the court about his father and his connection to Raphael and Sheriff Stilinski 

 

“On behalf of the court and the justice system, we apologize for your wrongful incarceration, of our handling of your safety and any suffering this has caused. The city counsel have also reached an agreement to pay for your father's hospital stay after the incident as well as reimburse you for time and money lost while under investigation,” Yukimura said, sitting on her podium. She smiled at Stiles when he came in and he was sure Derek had been right. She’d known something. “Mayor Whittemore has been suspended pending investigation for the crimes against your father along with Vice Sheriff McCall. Sheriff,” she said and turned to Stiles father, “whenever you feel ready the position as Sheriff has been reinstated in your name.” 

 

“Thank you, your honor,” he said politely and bowed his head. Stiles did the same. He couldn’t stop staring at his father, because he couldn’t believe he as home, safe and albeit a bit fuzzy at times but _ safe _ .

 

“Now, I hope to never see you here again in any other matter unless it is on the right side of the courtroom. Do you understand me Stilinski?” she said and turned to Stiles. 

 

“Yes your honor! I promise!” he stuttered. 

 

“Good, now the two of you need a vacation. Court adjourned!” she said and slammed her gavel. Stiles grinned at her and his father as he walked out of there. 

 

“I’ll fire Brunski when I get back.” his dad said and Stiles looked at him questionaly. 

 

“Why?” 

 

“Peter showed me the video from the holding cells. That man has no job with my department. Ever again. He smiled at Stiles and ruffled his hair and Stiles grinned. Fucking Brunski. 

 

♠ ♣ ♥ ♦

 

Stiles stood nervously at the door, afraid to knock. He didn’t have to as Derek opened the door and sighed. “What do you want, Stiles.” he sighed and Stiles grinned at the blind man. 

 

“You saved my life, saved my dad. You train him, made him a part of your little gang, made me a part of your little gang,” he said and Derek scrunched his eyebrows together. “So now, I’m going to kiss you, say thank you and then I’m going to go home and stare at my not dead father,” he rambled. 

 

“You’re gonna do what?” Derek asked in disbelief. 

 

“Kiss you, kiss you til you can't breathe.” Stiles said as he closed the distance between them dragging Derek in by his tie and placed his lips on Derek’s. 

  
  
  
  
  


**Works inspired by this one:**

  * [Art for Hook](https://archiveofourown.org/works/15159806) by [Anneofnyc](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Anneofnyc/pseuds/Anneofnyc)




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